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ALFRED BRUNSON, PIONEER OF 
WISCONSIN METHODISM 



BY 

ELLA C. BRUNSON 




Reprinted from the Wisconsin Magazine of History 
Volume II, Number 2, December, 1918 




ALFRED liKUXSON 

Iroiii a photograjili in the Wi.scon.sin Historical Library 



ALFRED BRUNSON, PIONEER OF 
WISCONSIN METHODISM 



BY 

ELLA C. BRUNSON 







Reprinted from the Wisconsin Magazine of History 
Volume II, Number 2, December, 1918 




ALFRED BRUNSON, PIONEER OF WISCONSIN 
METHODISM 

Ella C. Brunson 

With his characteristic regard for detail, the subject ot 
this sketch opened the "Birth Record" of his immediate family 
with: "Alfred, born in Danbury, Ct. on the morning of Feby 
9, 1793, in one of the worst snow storms of history." Fre- 
quently through life, when referring to this event, he ex- 
pressed some curiosity to know whether the storm had had any 
influence on his career, which, at times, bore a close resemblance 
to the weather on the day of his advent. His father, Ira, was 
a direct descendant of Richard Brownson, a member of the 
company of Rev. Joseph Hooker, who came in 1633 from 
Braintree, England, to escape the religious intolerance ot 
that period. Alfred was the oldest of the seven children bom 
to Ira and Permelia Cozier Brownson. As young Alfred 
grew up he attended school, in the winter seasons, from the 
age of seven to that of twelve years, but his time in summer 
was needed to help his father who was crippled with rheuma- 
tism, contracted through overindulgence in athletic games 
and subsequent careless exposure. 

When Alfred was seven years old the family removed to 
Sing Sing, New York, where his father operated a ferry 
across the Hudson River, conducted an inn at the landing, 
and established and managed a brickyard and a stone quarry. 
The eldest son, a large and unusually sturdy lad, a natural 
adept and an apt pupil, soon became an expert in many oc- 
cupations, and as his father's assistant learned to run the ferry- 
boat, a piragua of two masts. He thus acquired a nautical 
knowledge of inestimable value to him in his pioneer life on 
the western frontier, where much of the travel was by the 
waterways. Young Alfred's chief pastime was casting 
cannon, making wooden guns, and building forts ; as a leader 



2 Ella C. Brunson 

among his comrades he equipped them with arms and trained 
them as soldiers in the methods of warfare which he learned 
from his books and from the conversation of his elders. So 
marked was his military taste that his father planned to edu- 
cate him for the army, and to this end sent him to a local 
academy which prepared students for West Point. But the 
accident in 1806 that cost his father's life brought the boy's 
air castles to the ground, and changed the entire trend of his 
life. During a violent gale his father, returning from across 
the river, attempted to land the boat, when, hampered by 
heavy clothing and his movements hindered by his crippled 
condition, he was struck by the sail and brushed into the water. 
Alfred, seeing the accident from a distance, ran to the land- 
ing, sprang into a skiff, and, with a man to row for him, 
attempted to effect a rescue ; but the wet hair of the drown- 
ing man slipped through the lad's fingers, and, powerless 
to help him, he saw his father sink for the last time. Although 
a mere boy in years, this incident made the lad a man ; from 
that hour he assumed, with his mother's aid, the care of the 
six younger children. When the estate of the father was 
settled an error on the part of the lawyer in charge changed 
the spelling of the name from Brownson to Brunson, an 
orthography retained by the family since that time. ( Other 
branches dropped the w, spelling the name Bronson, while 
still others retain the original orthography, Brownson.) 

It was deemed advisable, in view of the changed circum- 
stances of the family, to return to Danbury where young 
Alfred was apprenticed to a shoemaker, his mother's brother, 
son of Benjamin and Sarah Cozier, early and prominent 
settlers of Connecticut. Alfred soon became proficient in this 
trade, and in the new country to which he was later to emigrate 
it proved a useful acquirement. 

Someone once said: "A great man condemns his friends 
to the task of explaining him." This was sufficiently tme of 
Alfred Brunson to justify a few words regarding his personal 



Alfred Brunson 3 

appearance and characteristics. One's first impression upon 
meeting him was that he was an austere man, abrupt and 
gruff, but when one came to know him, he was found to be 
genial and approachable, while the abiding impression made 
by his strong personality was that of a plain honest man who 
loved justice and fair deahng. In person he was straight, 
well-knit, and powerful, weighing in his full vigor from two 
hundred to two hundred twenty-five pounds ; he was as ath- 
letic as his o^vn father had been, dignified in carriage, with a 
long head, jaw square rather than oval, a massive foj-ehead, 
above which, after his fortieth year, was a halo of grey hair. 
Thus he was distinguished and attractive in appearance. 

]\Iuch of the literary activity to which the later years of his 
life were devoted was in the nature of controversy, but he 
conducted it without bitterness or narrowness. If the subject 
was one upon which his experience gave him authority to 
speak, he wrote naturally, with a good command of language 
for a self-educated man. His zeal for what he thought to be 
the truth sometimes led him to vehemence of expression, but 
even his intensity was coupled with charity of spirit toward his 
opponent, his antagonism being directed toward the error 
rather than the person. Loyalty was a deep and fixed princi- 
ple of his conduct; for his country, his church, and his friends, 
he was an able advocate, but woe to the perverter of truth, 
the traitor, or the inhumane ; for them he had at his command 
severe language, and in his denunciation of crime or injustice 
he never minced his words. Hospitable to the verge of em- 
barrassing his family, he always kept "the latch-string out," 
and especially welcome, next to those of his kin, were "those 
of the household of faith." No visitor came with a need, 
temporal or spiritual, that it was not promptly met to the best 
of the host's ability, and he frequently said in later years that 
the "bread cast upon the water" in pioneer days, returned 
long afterwards in the form of loaves for crumbs. How he 
loved inquiring youth ! No questioner ever came to him that 



4 Ella C. Branson 

pen, paper, or book was not gladly laid aside to consider and 
explain any matter within his ken. No one, however, knew his 
limitations better than he himself, and if not able to answer 
a question, he promptly admitted the fact, but lost no time in 
acquiring all possible knowledge upon the subject. He par- 
ticularly admired a good command of language, and often 
said that he acquired his own knowledge of its use by listening 
to tlie best scholars and remembering their construction of 
sentences and use of words. 

To his keen sense of the ludicrous and love of a good story, 
of which he had a rare collection, Mr. Brunson attributed his 
ability to throw off and forget annoyances that to other 
natures would have been a serious handicap. With a really 
good and appropriate story for all occasions he often turned 
what promised to be a grievous altercation into a hearty laugh, 
ending the matter in complete understanding. He never 
laughed aloud, but shook and chuckled till tears rolled down 
his cheeks, and long after turning his attention to other things 
a smile would play about his mouth. 

Prematurely developed by the circumstances of his early 
life, and the hardships then the lot of those dependent upon 
their own resources, Alfred Brunson took up a man's work 
before he was out of his teens. The invincible spirit dis- 
played in his boyhood games remained with him through life. 
Having assured himself that he was right before he under- 
took any new or unusual task, nothing dismayed or made him 
afraid; his mind was firmly fixed upon the thought that the 
Divine Power, upon which he depended with a childlike faith, 
was with him in all things. Never, after his conversion, which 
was the direct result of his father's tragic death, did he doubt 
for a moment that he was led, guided, and, in answer to prayer, 
directed in what he did. If his efforts met failure, he judged 
that the fault was within himself, or that it was providential 
interference, and that there was something else for him to do, 
in which he would succeed. 



Alfred Brunson 5 

After several years at Danbury, Connecticut, Alfred 
Brunson was married at the age of nineteen to Eunice Burr, 
a distant cousin of Aaron Burr, and the young couple soon 
went as missionaries of the Methodist Episcopal Church to 
the Western Reserve, a new field in far-away Ohio. Finding 
himself near the frontier where the struggle between the new 
country and England was in progress, he placed his family in 
safety, and enlisted in the Twenty-seventh United States 
Infantry, then being recruited at Warren, Ohio, and v/as 
made orderly sergeant of his company. His diary of the 
ensuing campaign is now in the Wisconsin State Historical 
Library. The author's experiences likewise furnished the 
topic for many a long winter evening story, never to be for- 
gotten by his children and friends. They loved to persuade 
him to relate his early adventures, for he was a natural stor}'-- 
teller, and with his remarkable memory and his well-stored 
mind, he made an evening pass most entertainingly. 

Among the incidents narrated by him of that historical 
period, one that never failed to hold the attention of his 
children concerned the primitive methods of living in the 
camp of that early day. The crude manner of preparing 
their rations, to which the soldiers were driven in 1812, proved 
the old adage: "Necessity is the mother of invention." Once 
while the members of his company v/ere camping at tlm mouth 
of the Huron River, waiting for a violent wind to subside 
before they could cross on their route to Fort Stevenson, they 
found themselves separated from even their limited camp 
equipment, but having rations with them, they prepared them 
much after the manner of the native Americans whom they 
were fighting. They built a fire of driftwood on the shore, 
mixed flour and river water in pieces of bark or any receptacle 
they were fortunate enough to have, and without salt, yeast, 
or shortening wrapped the dough in bark or leaves, and baked 
it in the ashes, or before the open fire as the hoecake of the 
South is baked. Bits of salt pork impaled on sticks were 



6 Ella C. Brunson 

broiled to a turn, and both bread and meat tasted like a ban- 
quet to the tired and hungry men. 

A story of the sentinel, who mistook a black turkey for an 
Indian and shot it, was a never ending source of entertain- 
ment to his children. The shot that killed the turkey alarmed 
the whole camp and brought the men to arms. How the rising 
moon, full and red, was mistaken for the dreaded English 
craft Queen Charlotte, armed with "seventeen long guns," 
the terror of the Lakes, was another tale that held us spell- 
bound. Preparations were at once made to give the visitor 
a warm welcome, and the soldier boys were greatly disap- 
pointed when the alarm proved to be false. Real soldier 
experiences were the long nights of camping with no shelter 
from pouring rain, when the men were obliged to lie upon 
their guns to keep them dry, expecting every moment to be 
attacked. So infested were the woods with skulking, hostile 
Indians, that American soldiers passing from one of their own 
camps to another were frequently killed, as were many of the 
men who went out to rescue the bodies of their fallen com- 
panions. Mr. Brmison heard the story of the death of the 
great war chief, Tecumseh, from the lips of the chief's own 
aide-de-camp. In after life he prepared an article on this 
much-mooted subject which was published in the fourth 
volume of the Wisconsin Historical Collections. 

At the expiration of his year of enlistment. General Cass, 
under whose direct observation Sergeant Brunson had served 
at the head of a platoon in the stead of a commissioned officer, 
sent for him and offered him the first vacancy among the 
lieutenants; the company also asked the privilege of buying 
his uniform and sword if he would remain with them, but he 
declined both offers, preferring to "be about his Father's 
business" in the calling to which he had consecrated his life. 
So he returned to Ohio to continue his missionary work. Long 
quiet years of earnest effort followed, while one after another 
his children were born and a little family grew up around him. 



Alfred Brunson 7 

These were years of self-sacrifice and hard work, preparatory 
to his future upon the far American frontier. His last sta- 
tion in that part of the country was at Meadville, Pennsyl- 
vania, where he was for several years a member of the board 
of trustees of Allegheny College. 

In 1835 a call came for missionaries to go to the Northwest 
Tenitory, to minister both to the whites and to the Indians 
of the frontier. ]VIr. Brunson was instrumental in bringing 
the need before the Pittsburgh Conference, of which he was 
a member, and the presiding bishop urged him to accept the 
responsibility of founding a mission in this new field. His 
family consented that he should visit the country before de- 
ciding to move there, and he soon set forth in company with 
his colleague, the Reverend jNIr. Weigley. In six weeks, in a 
biiggy with two horses, they drove over one thousand miles 
from Meadville to Springfield, Illinois. From the first 
glimpse thereof they v/ere attracted to the western country 
and determined to make it their future field of work. They 
reached Illinois in time to attend the annual conference, the 
farthest western ^lethodist conference then organized. At 
that session Mr. Weigley was assigned to the district of 
Galena, while ^Ir.Bn.mson's circuit covered the territory from 
Rock Island, Illinois, to St. Anthony's Falls, IMinnesota, a 
district five-hundred miles in length, and seventy-five in width. 
Dubuque, Iowa, was the only settlement west of the ^lissis- 
sippi River, and those upon the eastern side were few. Mr. 
Brunson, in order to enter the country north of the Wiscon- 
sin River, made his way on horseback to Fort Crawford 
at Prairie du Chien, arriving there late in the fall of the same 
year. This trip was often referred to by him as one of the 
most difiicult but one of the most interesting of his whole hfe. 
The country was sparsely settled and abounded in wild ani- 
mals; the road was nature's own highway, except where it 
was possible to follow the military road made in 1834 by the 
soldiers from Fort Winnebago (where Portage, Wisconsin, 



8 Ella C. Brunson 

now stands) to Fort Crawford, at Prairie dii Chien. On the 
outward route Platteville was the first place in Wisconsin 
where ]Mr. Brunson stopped. There the proverbial frontier 
hospitality soon drove from his mind the impleasant features 
of the trip. Lancaster was the next settlement reached and 
here his notes state: "Occupied the room with Sir Charles 
JMurray, a chamberlain of Queen Victoria, sent over by that 
estimable and enterprising lady, to select lands on which to 
make entry, but paying taxes for many years and then selling 
at a loss would indicate a case of mistaken judgment." The 
journey from Lancaster to Cassville was made with but one 
break, "at the home of a brother in Christ, where I was most 
cordially received and entertained in the true pioneer spirit." 
The people along the route were overjoyed to see a newcomer, 
and although often but one member of the house was a pro- 
fessed Christian, the entire family welcomed a stranger from 
the East, particularly when he was one who could be trusted. 
Church people, of vrhatever orthodox denomination, v/ere 
distinctly glad to see a missionary of an established church 
society, and welcomed a speaker on sacred as well as temporal 
subjects.^ 

It was truly on the verge of civilization our traveler found 
himself after crossing the Wisconsin Hiver, but even at that 
late season he thought it a promising country, and the sandy 
soil appealed to one tired of clay, mud, and soggy turf, be- 
cause the rain drained oft at once, and in half an hour after 
a downpour walking was comfortable. Inquiry made of the 
residents at the little settlement of Prairie du Chien as well 
as of the military men at the post of Fort Crawford elicited 
the following information which is copied from the traveler's 
own notes : 

Prairie du Chien, written by the French settlers "La Prairie des 
Chiens," — and being translated meaning "the prairie of dogs," because of 
the great number of the little animals found here, was the second settle- 

1 The journal of this trip is published in Wn, Hist. Colls., XV, 264-91. 



Alfred Brunson 9 

ment in this section. The Fox Indians being camped here at the time of 
the naming of the settlement, with a chief named "Dog," may have had 
some influence in the matter of naming the colony. There were well built 
Indian houses here when the first white man came, and the natives had 
gardens and live stock, but my own will be the first frame building in the 
country. The earlier comers learned much of value from the Indians and 
we in turn gathered from them invaluable information in pioneering useful 
now and anywhere in an emergency. The use of sugar to preserve 
meat when salt was exhausted was a new idea, but practical, as are many 
Indian customs we may well copy. Game was plentiful and all animal 
food easy to procure, either by traps or from native hunters. 

It is of record that in 1804 a Frenchman by the name of Roulette 
[Rolette] and a Scotchman named Cannon [Campbell] appeared at the 
settlement and established a fur-trading post among the Indians and 
French hunters already on the ground, and those who came for many years 
after. Descendants of Roulette still live here and are counted among the 
substantial citizens. 

When the war of 1812 broke out the inhabitants of this thriving 
settlement drove out all English sympathizers, and the island in the 
river being most thickly settled, became the village proper, every precau- 
tion being taken for the safety of the settlers. But the English learned of 
the lack of troops then at the place and surprised the Americans and 
natives (French) taking and holding possession of the Ft. then established 
at the north end of the island, until the close of the war in 1816, when 
Col. Hamilton occupied it and built a blockhouse on the site later occupied 
by the H. L. Dousman residence. An earthquake was said to have shaken 
the territory in those early days but none has been felt since. 

The location of the Fort it seems was changed twice. The first one 
was located at the north end of the island, the second on the main land, 
and the third, built in 1830 by Zachary Taylor, Commandant, stood near 
the middle of the length of the prairie, on the hill overlooking the river. 
Taylor was in command at the time of my arrival and to him and his 
officers I was indebted for many courtesies shown me and my family, our 
home being made with them in the Fort until the completion of our house, 
brought with us, and erected half a mile south-east of the Fort. 

At the time of the building of the last Fort but one American family 
was numbered among the two-hundred inhabitants of the place, the 
remainder being French, Indian and half-breeds. But from that date the 
town had grown and on my arrival there were four-hundred souls within 
its boundary, three American families, and two-hundred officers and sol- 



10 Ella C. Brunson 

diers in the garrison. No doubt the protection offered by the Fort, should 
the need arise, attracted settlers to that locality, and the nature of the 
soil, the majestic river and beautiful bluffs on both sides of the river, 
made an attractive setting for a new town. The most prominent of its 
citizens at this date were the Roulette, Brisbois and Jean Baptist Fari- 
bault families. 

The first steamboat to come up the Mississippi River was the "Vir- 
ginia" from St. Louis, and its landing was a great event in the history of 
the place. No citizen able to walk Avas absent on the occasion, and the 
feeling that they were really connected with the great outside world, was 
established. This was increased in 1823 when a post office was estab- 
lished, and mails were received once in two months in the summer, and 
once in the winter seasons, letters folded in a sheet of fools-cap paper, 
addressed and stamped on same. 

While well pleased from the first with this new country, 
Mr. Brunson did not consider taking his family farther into 
the wilds, and decided to locate at Fort Crawford, for protec- 
tion in case of an uprising among the Indians so thick about 
them, and not always peaceable. With this thought in mind 
he purchased of the government a tract of land, and made 
arrangements for the reception of himself and family on their 
arrival. Leaving Prairie du Chien December 29, 1835, on 
horseback, he rode to Meadville, arriving in February, 1836, 
having been gone from home six months, traveling, mostly 
in the saddle, about three thousand miles, part of the time in 
the winter season, without losing a day on account of illness. 

Mr. Brunson had in the meantime communicated with his 
wife, a most businesslike and competent helpmeet, and she 
had contracted for a keel boat, and a dwelling house, built in 
sections ready to be put together, every door and window 
ready for its place — the whole to be loaded at a given date 
for the journey to the new country. The house, eighteen by 
thirty-four feet, two stories, with an ell twenty by twenty- 
seven feet, was ready on the missionaiy's arrival at home, but 
business affairs delayed the departure of himself and family 
until the middle of June. So great was the interest among 



3- d 



5 > 



1 ' -' 



■SS 




Alfred Brunson 11 

his neighbors at the return of one from the unknown West, 
that Mr. Bininson was called upon to lecture, to write, and 
to talk incessantly of what he had seen and learned. 

At the horn- set for the Brunsons to leave the dock at 
Meadville, the place was thronged with people, some coming- 
out of curiosity, but most of them as friends to wish the 
travelers Godspeed, for no one felt they would ever see the 
venturesome emigrants again. A missionary hymn was 
sung, prayers were offered, and after a tearful farewell the 
boat with the family, house, and worldly goods, started on 
its trip, going down the canal to French Creek, and thence 
down the Allegheny River to Pittsburgh. With the Brun- 
sons on the boat were two young men who had been engaged 
for a year's service in the new countiy, a carpenter and a 
day laborer. At Portsmouth, Ohio, the party was joined 
by Mr. Brunson's sister and her family. Her husband v^^as 
later the founder of the town of Patch Grove, Grant County, 
residing there until his death. 

As far as St. Louis the trip was made by contract witli 
a steamboat captain, who was pledged to tow the flat boat 
to that place for the sum of two hundred fifty dollars. The 
trip was made without special incident, except the wetting 
the passengers received when limning the Falls of the Ohio. 
At St. Louis, for the consideration of six hundred fifty 
dollars Mr. Brunson contracted for the towing of the boat 
to Prairie du Chien, where it landed July 16, 1836. He 
immediately began the erection of the house, splitting the 
lath for it with his own hand. There are yet to be seen places 
where the hard lime plaster is from one-half to two inches 
thick, in order to smooth the inequalities of the handmade 
lath. The writer visited this house last summer after an 
absence of thirty years, and found it in a remarkable state of 
preservation, after its eighty-one years of storm and sun- 
shine, with some of the original plaster still in place. 



12 Ella C. Brunson 

Prairie du Chien was, at the date of the landing of the 
Brunson family, the principal depot for the upper T^Iissis- 
sipi)i and its tributaries, most of the travel being along these 
waterways. All about were bands of Indians, and robberies 
and murders were not unusual occurrences. Parties leaving 
Prairie du Chien for distant points went, as far as possible, 
in fleets too strong for the marauders, exchanging at the 
Prairie the smaller boats in which they came over inland 
streams for those of larger size used upon the Mississippi. 
Each fall they came to the Prairie with goods for the trade, 
which in those days were brought from ^lontreal to Green 
Bay through the Lakes, up the Fox River to where Portage 
now stands, and thence to Prairie du Chien. 

Before Mr. Brunson's advent the first Sunday school in 
Wisconsin had been established at Prairie du Chien by ]Mrs. 
Lockwood, wife of a well-known fur trader, and sister of 
Major William and Doctor Wright, both stationed at Fort 
Crawford. Mrs. Lockwood took an untiring interest in all 
that tended to the educational and religious growth of the 
town, and to the end of her long and useful life was held in 
the highest regard by the entire community. 

Mr. Brunson felt the need of an interpreter for his mis- 
sionary work, and learning of a mulatto slave, named Jim 
Thompson, who had been converted, had something of the 
missionary spirit, and was above the average of his race in 
education and mental ability, he approached the slave's 
master, a Kentucky officer stationed at Fort Snelling, and 
ascertained that Jim could be purchased for twelve hundred 
dollars. The missionary then wrote a letter to the Methodist 
publications of the time, setting forth his need and the ambi- 
tion of the slave, and the result was that the money was 
quickly raised and foi'warded. Jim was set free and at once 
became a capable and faithful interpreter. He served long 
and well, settling at the end of his years of usefulness in St. 
Paul, where he died at an advanced age, in 1884. He was 



Alfred B run son 13 

a loyal and consistent Christian, devoted as a servant, and 
never happier than when his voice was lifted in the sweet 
tones of his mother's race singing the hymns of the church, 
or the melodies of his o^vn people. He was a famous hunter, 
and the game needed for food was secured by him on excur- 
sions into the wilderness of the great territory. But Jim 
was not without another inheritance from his mother; his 
superstitious fears were not always in complete abeyance to 
his religious behef in Divine protection, and exposed him to 
many a practical joke played by his associates. 

When the Brunsons settled at Prairie du Chien lumber 
was selling at "twenty dollars per thousand feet as it came 
from the water, good, bad, and indifferent, and mechanics 
labor two and a half to five dollars per day, while their 
method of performing the same was only about enough to 
give them a good appetite for meals." The west side ot 
the river was without civil government, and the lead mines 
having attracted wide attention, military authority was fre- 
quently necessary to protect the enterprising miners from the 
aborigines who protested silently but ineffectually against 
the invasion of the white man. The Indians were eventually 
persuaded to cede the land to the United States. Justice was 
but badly administered in this new country, and often the 
people were compelled to take matters into their own hands ; 
in the event of a serious crime they "gathered at a given place, 
appointed judge, clerk and sheriff. The empaneled jury, 
finding a bill against the accused, he was arraigned, counsel 
and petit jury being provided, and following the usual forms 
of trial, the culprit was found guilty and hanged all within 
a few days, although witnesses testified that the form of law 
was always strictly observed." The primitive days were full 
of narrow escapes and many dangers, although the Indians 
were always faithful and friendly to the "White Babbit," 
a name given ]Mr. Brunson by the Kickapoo Indians because 
of his abundant white hair and gentle patience. 



14 Ella C, Brunson 

After two or three years of missionary work, Mr. Briin- 
son's health failed, and he determined to study lav/. In the 
fall of 1840, after having been admitted to the bar, he was 
elected to the house of representatives of the territory. That 
year he first visited Madison, whither the capital had been 
removed from Belmont, and which he describes as "A beauti- 
fully situated village," but "the vice and wickedness of the 
whole territory seemed to be concentrated there." He was 
especially shocked at the number of "sharpers" who assem- 
bled at the place, "trying to skin Uncle Sam," and the "ap- 
pointment of as many clerks and officers to the two houses 
as there were in Congress." But his study of human nature 
had taught him the folly of making open v/arfare on every 
opinion that differed from his own, so he contented himself 
with using what influence he could when preaching on Sun- 
days in Representative Hall to foil the dishonest and per- 
sonal ambitions so much in evidence. Mr. Bi-unson was a 
Whig in politics, while most of the people of the territory 
were Democrats; he was, therefore, soon retired from public 
office. But before this occurred he had been able to forward 
some important measures that tended to make the West, and 
particularly the community that elected him, a more desirable 
place in which to settle. While dissatisfied with the legis- 
lative session as a whole, he acquired information that m.ade 
him in demand later as a campaign speaker. 

In 1842 Mr. Brunson received from the federal govern- 
ment, at the suggestion of Governor James D. Doty, a com- 
mission as subagent to the La Pointe Indian Agency of the 
Lake Superior country. The trip to that region, made the 
following year, was one of intense interest to him, being for 
the most part, except for the trails of fur traders, through 
primitive and unexplored territory. Most of the traveling in 
that country was then by the waterways, and in the summer 
season, so it was with unusual care that Mr. Bmnson's party 
prepared for the long overland spring journey. The cara- 



Alfred Brunson 15 

van consisted of three wagons, nine yoke of oxen, three horses 
and fourteen men, including Mr. Brunson's oldest son, Jim, 
the interpreter, and a miner named Whitaker, who was an ex- 
pert woodsman. They set out on May 24, 1843, as soon as 
grass for the live stock was well started. Following the 
ridges of the bluff the leader guided his party through the 
wilderness, steered by the faithful compass that had piloted 
him from Pennsylvania, and which was never out of his 
pocket until the highways and landmarks of the territory were. 
well established. In the four hundred miles traveled, but 
two stops were made where white men were found, at the 
Falls of the Black and of the Chippewa rivers, where cities 
bearing these names now stand. One man during the journey 
wandered from the camp and was lost among the hills. Fol- 
lowing one stream after another he reached the settlement of 
La Crosse, undergoing hair-raising experiences en route; 
he thence went up stream to Black River Falls, where he 
arrived before the caravan did. 

The mills at these falls were then in the hands of Mor- 
mons, who were preparing to build a city and a temple at 
Nauvoo; they were prevailed upon to ferry the wagons, 
horses, and men across the river, while the cattle swam. From 
this point the course of travel lay northwest. On this lap 
of the journey two of the three horses wandered away from 
camp at night and were not found, so the party went on some- 
what handicapped. In later years Mr. Brunson vv^as told by 
a traveler that he had seen the bones of two horses with the 
remnants of rope by which they had been tied to billets of 
wood, in the vicinity of the last camp occupied by the caravan ; 
the presumption was that the animals had become entangled 
in the thicket, and unable to extricate themselves, had been 
killed by flies which were unusually bad that year. 

The wayfarers passed by the pipestone hill so dear to the 
hearts of all Indians of that day, and in his notes Mr. Brunson 
says : "That stone will some day become an important article 



16 Ella C. Brunson 

of commerce because of its ornamental beauty and peculiar 
quality. It is so soft it can be cut with a knife when taken 
from the quarrj^ but polished and exposed to the air becomes 
as hard as marble." The imposing buildings of the Twin 
Cities of INIinnesota bear out his prophetic statement. In 
later years JMr. Brunson, when riding through the tunnel 
on the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway between 
Mauston and La Crosse, went directly under the trail over 
which he had passed in 1848. 

On all trips through the country, then almost unknown 
to the white man, Mr. Brunson wrote many letters of a de- 
scriptive character, which at every opportunity he mailed back 
to civilization. These descriptions sometimes found their way 
into print and drew the attention of people who contemplated 
emigrating to the West. It v/as not an unusual occurrence 
for their author to be called upon by total strangers who gave 
him the pleasant assurance that their coming to the nev/ coun- 
try had been due to these articles. Mr. Brunson addressed 
a letter to Governor Doty, describing his first trip to the 
Lake Superior region, which description was said to have 
brought to notice a vast and fertile portion of the territory. 
It was printed by the order of the territorial legislature, to 
which the communication was sent by the governor, and, 
scattered over the states in pamphlet form, it resulted in an 
exodus to the Black and Chippewa valleys. 

In these years of pioneer life Mr. Brunson's natural 
ingenuity gave him an advantage over many of the new- 
comers. He was always ready to suggest a way out of a 
dilenmia and some of them were certainly novel ways. The 
winter of 1855-56 was an unusually early one; the snow fell 
to a great depth before the ground had frozen. The first 
heavy fall found him seventy miles from home in a buggy. 
His Yankee ingenuity came to his rescue, and, securing the 
assistance of a workman, he set about the business of getting 
home. Thev built a rough sled of boards and removing the 



Alfred Brunson 17 

wheels from the buggy lashed it firmly to the sled, the pole 
still serving its purpose, with the wheels fastened under and 
behind the buggy box. With this device the horses had easy 
work and reached Prairie du Chien in two days. Dr. Elliott, 
then editor of the Christian Advocate, found endless amuse- 
ment in this incident, and commenting on it said: "None but 
a genuine backwoodsman would have thought of such a con- 
trivance." 

Living under all the presidents from Washington to 
Hayes, ]\Ir. Brunson took the keenest interest in every phase 
of political life, and his pen was frequently active on subjects 
of national moment. At times he was moved to verse, his 
most notable production being "Patriotic Piety," which was 
often printed fifty years ago, after his return from the Civil 
War. "The Tarpaulin Jacket," a semireligious song, full 
of nautical terms made to apply to the voyage of life, gave 
evidence of the hopeful chart by which he steered his own 
craft. 

In an early day ]Mr. Brunson became a member of the 
Masonic Order, which he held in regard next to the church 
he served. In 1850, after suffering defeat in a judicial 
campaign, he once more entered the Methodist ministry and 
became a member of the West Wisconsin Conference. Two 
years later he was appointed presiding elder of Prairie du 
Chien district. Though sometimes away for months at a 
time in the performance of his duty, first among the Indians, 
later as presiding elder, ^Ir. BiTmson had no other home 
after coming west than Prairie du Chien. He saw the settle- 
ment grow from a village to a city, and in all the years felt 
the deepest interest in its progress, being always ready to 
participate in any work for the advancement of the com- 
munity and its welfare. He was the first chairman of a school 
board in the settlement, chosen some time before a school was 
really established. "A History of the Lower Town School 
District" from his pen, read at the dedication of a "new stone 



18 Ella C. Brunson 

school house" in 1856, is still in manuscript and contains inter- 
esting bits of local history. His brief visits home between 
Sundays, or, when in charge of the Prairie du Chien District 
he held quarterly meetings in the home town, were looked 
forward to and planned for as in any family the coming of 
the dearly beloved head is anticipated. But then, as after 
he was superannuated, he was never idle, and we seemed to 
know instinctively that he was not to be disturbed when writ- 
ing. When work v/as laid aside, however, he gave us his un- 
divided time and attention, and his family was his sole interest. 
He had in an early day built in one end of the carriage house 
a long and well-equipped carpenter's workbench, and, when 
weary of mental exercise, he was often found there with his 
tools, busy on some convenience for the house, some necessary 
repairs, or some toy for the little ones of the family ; for this 
occupation he had a natural gift that had been practiced 
diligently in the primitive days on a western farm. 

When the Civil War began, Mr. Brunson, although far 
beyond the age when men are expected to undertake active 
military operations, volunteered, his services were accepted 
as a chaplain, and he was assigned to the Thirty-first Regi- 
ment of Wisconsin Volunteers. In the summer of 1863 ill 
health made a furlough necessary, and this, because of physi- 
cal weakness, was terminated by resignation. To him belongs 
the rare honor of having served his country both in the War 
of 1812 and in that of 1861-65. After the war, he continued 
his work as a Methodist itinerant until 1873, v/hen he had 
attained the age of eighty. He was during his later years 
one of the most prominent members of West Wisconsin Con- 
ference, and was four times chosen to represent it at the 
quadrennial General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal 
Church. 

Nothing in later life gave this enthusiastic and inde- 
fatigable worker the pain that came to his heart with the 
realization that he was "a superannuate." No regret of his 



Alfred Brunson 19 

life was so poignant. His usefulness, however, was not termi- 
nated, and with the undaunted spirit that had characterized 
his entire life, he met this new adversity — for such he looked 
upon it. He was made an associate editor of the Northwestern 
Christian Advocate published at Cliicago, an honorary cor- 
respondent of the New England Methodist Historical So- 
ciety, and he became a correspondent of several newspapers 
and magazines whose management valued the ripe knowledge, 
clear thinking, and reasoning faculties, that, to the end, re- 
mained unclouded. 

Among the articles from his pen the following are in the 
Wisconsiri Historical Collections: "Ancient Mounds of Craw- 
ford County"; "Wisconsin Geographical Names"; "Early 
History of Wisconsin"; "Sketch of Hole-in-the-day" ; "A 
Methodist Circuit Rider's Tour"; "Death of Tecumseh;" 
"Memoir of Thomas Pendelton Burnett." In the press of 
his day appeared articles showing the wide range of subjects 
to which he gave thought and attention. Some of these sub- 
jects were: "Tom Paine's Death"; "Death of Old Abe"; 
"How Life Looks at Eighty-three"; "The Irrepressible 
Woman Preacher" ; "Universal Taxation" ; "Masonic Corner- 
stone"; "The Turko-Russian War, a Prophecy"; "Spelling 
Reform"; "The Pillager Indian"; "Sketch of Political His- 
tory"; "Water in Wisconsin," etc. He was also the author 
of two books. In 1872 the Methodist Book Concern brought 
out in two volumes, A Western Pioneer: or incidents in the 
Life and Times of Rev. Alfred Brunson related by himself; 
and nine years later the same house published his Key to the 
Apocalypse. 

Mr. Brunson's first family consisted of two sons and six 
daughters all of whom were grown and married at the time of 
their mother's death, which occurred during the epidemic of 
fever that swept over the country in 1846. The sons, Ira 
Burr and Benjamin W., surveyed much of the new ten-itory 
into which they came with their father, and laid out the city 



20 Ella C, Brunson 

of St. Paul where Benjamin lived from its early settlement t ; 
the time of his death in 1898. The elder, Ira Burr, always 
lived near his father, and between them existed one of those 
rare bonds that bridged the twenty years that lay between 
their ages in a companionship more like that of brothers or 
friends than that of father and son. Mr. Brunson's second 
marriage was to Miss Caroline S. Birge, of Belvidere, Illi- 
nois, and to her two daughters came, Mrs. Elizabeth B. 
Hitchcock, still a resident of Wisconsin, and the writer of this 
sketch. We are said to be the only children in Wisconsin of 
a participant in both the War of 1812 and the Civil War. Mr. 
Brunson's third wife was Miss Malinda Richards, of Paris 
Hill, New York; she survived him ten years. 

On the morning of August 3, 1882, the subject of this 
sketch passed from life after months of painful suffering, 
borne with the meek patience that was the strongest argument 
possible for the faith he so loyally defended. He sleeps in the 
old Lower Town Cemetery at Prairie du Chien, where his 
grave has been marked by the Daughters of 1812 and by the 
Grand Army of the Republic. 



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